HOMELESSNESS - SANTA CLARA COUNTY

Homelessness - Santa Clara County

Homelessness - Santa Clara County

Introduction

“Being homeless is something I never thought would happen to me,” says Steve Chehy, a homeless man living in San Jose. He lost his home after he was unable to pay off a loan, and he feels like he'll never be able to live in a house again. By the end of January 2007, the Santa Clara County Homeless Census and Survey estimated 7,202 homeless people in Santa Clara County (Burt et al, 2009). Only 29 percent of those people claimed to live in shelter facilities, leaving 71 percent unsheltered. More than half had been homeless for one year or more, while almost 21 percent indicated they had been homeless for more than three years, like Chehy.

Chehy lives in a camper he bought with his Social Security money. After being kicked out of his house, he was forced to live on the streets. Only 55 percent of homeless people claimed to receive some form of government assistance. Toward the end of 2007, the same census estimated 18,056 people were classified as being homeless at some point in time throughout that year. That number represented approximately one percent of the total population in Santa Clara County.

Discussion

Homelessness is an important problem, not just because it is a social problem, but also because it poses drastic mental health problems to individuals, especially women. In the past, the researchers failed to assess the significance of the issue, this lack of interest or we can say lack of information about the mental health problems faced by homeless women has hampered the authenticity of the already available research (Burt et al, 1999). The contemporary trend of doing research on homeless people started in 1970s. These studies did not address anything about mental health or disability ...